“Oh my! Hashan left that thing behind. Is that what it is, a telephone? I thought it must be a computer game. I have never even looked at it. I have no idea if it works. I imagine its batteries died long ago.”

Antar smiled. It was a smile that looked brittle, like it might crack in half.

“Do you mind if I take a look? The batteries might still work. I really do need to make a call.”

Luke glanced up at Greg Welch. Welch translated what Luke had just said. He stood there, watching Luke. It was almost as if the temperature in the room had just dropped twenty degrees.

Welch looked at the phone on the shelf.

A long pause drew out. Antar’s demeanor had changed. His brow was furrowed, like he was thinking. Then he seemed angry. He waved a hand. He spit something in Arabic. It sounded vicious, like a curse.

“Do what you like,” Greg said.

Luke looked at him.

Behind Welch, Eva Antar lingered in the doorway. Suddenly, there was a small black pistol in her hand. She pointed it at the back of Welch’s head.

“No!” Luke shouted. “Greg!”

BANG.

The noise was loud, but not deafening. It was a small gun, after all.

There was a moment, an instant, when Welch grimaced, his eyes squinting shut, probably not in pain, but in anticipation of what was about to happen. Then his face seemed to bulge for a split second, before spraying outward in a shower of blood and bone and flesh and gore.

Luke looked back at the old man. He had ripped open his jacket. What had appeared to be bandages earlier was a suicide vest. His shaking hands worked to pull the cord that would ignite the explosives. Luke noted a string of them working their way around the man’s torso—enough to blow the house apart.

Luke felt oddly frozen. It seemed impossible that this man, who had been quietly airing his grievances and his heartbreak and his tragedy a moment before, was going to…

Then Luke had his gun out. It happened automatically, animal instinct, with no conscious input from him. He fired, without taking aim.

BOOOM!

Antar’s head blew apart, much if it spraying out to his right. The noise was loud. The man’s face went blank, his hands slack, and he oozed bonelessly to the floor.

Then Ed Newsam was on his feet. Now he had a gun in hand.

He turned and faced off with the wife.

She pointed her small gun up at Ed.

BOOOM!